High Tide Aquatics

Crabby's "Elite210" tank at the Romberg Tiburon Center

Lyn,
I am getting more and more coralline all the time. This tank was set up with only seed LR so the coralline is slow to get going. I could try adding a bottle of purpleup I guess, but I was just going to give it more time, and add something that will eat every kind of algae!

and Thanks Patrick.
 
My tank is shedding red hair type algae. It did the green hair for over six months and it all shed away in weeks then replaced by this red. I have been pulling it and being patient. I now see rock and much more coraline. Who knows what the next outbreak will be. Good luck with yours.
 
I've had great results with Sea Hares. Just need to be sure to pass them on to someone else or return to store when the algae is gone, otherwise they will waste away.

I would also consider running GFO is you aren't already. Without GFO, my tank would be overrun with algae too.
 
Algae update: algae is lessening but not dead. On Tuesday I added a couple of white urchins, and about 35 trochid snails. I also removed the two large hermit crabs who may hassle the snails. And I added a lawnmower blenny, a likely foolish move considering the next paragraph.

Fish Parasite update: The isopod parasite that took the midas blenny last summer has struck again and has claimed the Naso unicorn tang. The decline was very sudden - about 1 week. The fish stopped eating, became lethargic, lost a lot of weight, and then on Tuesday night disappeared completely under the rock work somewhere. I suspect that the powder blue tang is also infected, but that fish remains active and is eating. I fear that the parasite will take the life of all of the fishes eventually and I vowed not to add any more fish to this tank, however in doing immediate battle with the hair algae so that new corals (see next paragraph) would not be overgrown, I felt I needed to try a number of different potential grazers including an algae blenny.

Corals update: I traded my 120G tru-vu tank to boun11 for a whole bunch of nice corals. I planted the first batch of the corals yesterday, including 3 large monti caps (a red, a green and a purple rim) that were so big that I needed to take the canopy off in order to move them into the tank (see below). More corals are coming in January and at that time I will take and post photos of the corals.

Equipment update: While I had the canopy off I decided to swap one of the reflectors from a large lumenarc to a mini lumenarc, so that both reflectors are minis. While I liked how the large lumenarc spread the light across the tank front, it was so large that working in the front of the tank was a hassle, with my arm basically pinned between the canopy frame and the reflector's edge. Now it will be easier to work in the tank without removing the canopy. Having the canopy off reminded me that both of the 400W 20K MH bulbs need replacing as it's been about 9 months of use for the bulbs. In the past I've used both SPS and Ushio bulbs. Anyone have locally-available favorite bulbs to recommend?
 
algae blennies really don't help keep algae under control, sorry to say :(

JIm, what ab's are ORA doing, or are they buying and reselling?
 
Thanks Jim,

Gresham, from what I have been told by the abalone farmers at ORA, the abalones are the green variety, Haliotis fulgens. They are not truly tropical, being native to the outer coast between Santa Barbara and Baja California, but can tolerate warmer waters. Thanks for your comment about the algae blenny. I've had them eat algae in the past so thought it would be worth a shot.
 
greens suck for reef tanks. I wondered where those were coming from. Get the cultured ones from Bali, or a couple donkey ears from PI. Those are light years better then a green for reef tanks. Greens are finicky and fickle. Just ask Jeremy :)
 
JAR said:
What do the abalone eat?
the ones around here eat kelp.
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From what I understand they graze on whatever they can get. When they are bigger the greens eat kelp, but when they are small they eat algal films and, I am hoping filamentous algae.
 
GreshamH said:
greens suck for reef tanks. I wondered where those were coming from. Get the cultured ones from Bali, or a couple donkey ears from PI. Those are light years better then a green for reef tanks. Greens are finicky and fickle. Just ask Jeremy :)
Click to expand...

I'll try one in the reef tank and see how it does - the rest can go into one of my temperate lab tanks where there is plenty of algae for them to graze, and where it's easy for us to feed macroalgae. Where does one obtain the Bali or donkey ears abalone you are referring to?
 
One would get them via their local LFS :)

They can be ordered via most wholesalers.

They (small greens) don't do much for filamentous algae unless it's cropped down to be very short. They will consume gracilaria from what many ab farmers have told me. I happen to work with a top abalone guru, someone who was instrumental in unlocking the life cycle back when Edison (pretty sure it was Edison and not PG&E) was being made to learn how to replace what they'd killed in Socal.
 
Jeremy (tuberider) worked at a Ab farm down south. Hopefully he sees this and chimes in as I bet he's got somethign to say about greens :)
 
I recommend dosing TechM (made by Kent). I've used it to dramatically decrease the algae in my tank. It works really well. The drawbacks are that it is not a permanent fix (the algae sometimes comes back) and that it decreases the metabolism of any snails you might have.
 
Greens typically eat micro algae to start, then need a massive amount of macro algae (Macrocystis) in order to survive, also temps over 74º F are a no, no. Not something I'd ever put in a reef tank, I'm surprised ORA has anything to do with them, too many problems.
 
tuberider said:
Greens typically eat micro algae to start, then need a massive amount of macro algae (Macrocystis) in order to survive, also temps over 74º F are a no, no. Not something I'd ever put in a reef tank, I'm surprised ORA has anything to do with them, too many problems.
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Thanks for confirming what I suspected :)
 
GreshamH said:
tuberider said:
Greens typically eat micro algae to start, then need a massive amount of macro algae (Macrocystis) in order to survive, also temps over 74º F are a no, no. Not something I'd ever put in a reef tank, I'm surprised ORA has anything to do with them, too many problems.
Click to expand...

Thanks for confirming what I suspected :)
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Thanks both of you for your comments. I really appreciate your expertise!
 
As always a wealth of info here. However (and of course this is anecdotal) the greens I have seem to devour the fluffy algae I have growing and they're showing new growth at the shop after 1 week. This doesn't contradict anything anyone else said as I know that hungry animals have a way of settling for any available food that they can access.
 
Crabby said:
GreshamH said:
greens suck for reef tanks. I wondered where those were coming from. Get the cultured ones from Bali, or a couple donkey ears from PI. Those are light years better then a green for reef tanks. Greens are finicky and fickle. Just ask Jeremy :)
Click to expand...

I'll try one in the reef tank and see how it does - the rest can go into one of my temperate lab tanks where there is plenty of algae for them to graze, and where it's easy for us to feed macroalgae. Where does one obtain the Bali or donkey ears abalone you are referring to?
Click to expand...
And are they captive bred or just tank raised?
 
bookfish said:
Crabby said:
GreshamH said:
greens suck for reef tanks. I wondered where those were coming from. Get the cultured ones from Bali, or a couple donkey ears from PI. Those are light years better then a green for reef tanks. Greens are finicky and fickle. Just ask Jeremy :)
Click to expand...

I'll try one in the reef tank and see how it does - the rest can go into one of my temperate lab tanks where there is plenty of algae for them to graze, and where it's easy for us to feed macroalgae. Where does one obtain the Bali or donkey ears abalone you are referring to?
Click to expand...
And are they captive bred or just tank raised?
Click to expand...
He said they're ORA greens ;)
 
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